Mark Esper, former defense secretary under President Trump, has said that should the allegations in the federal indictment against his boss be proven true, then he cannot be trusted with the nation’s secrets. “Well, based on his actions, if proven true, under the indictment by the special counsel, no,” Esper told CNN’s State of the Union host Jake Tapper on Sunday when asked the question. “It’s just irresponsible action that places our service members at risk, places our nation’s securities at risk. You cannot have these documents floating around. They need to be secured. We know how that happens. Only authorized persons that are allowed to receive documents or receive information from documents. So we’ve got to take this very seriously. These are serious issues.” Esper served as Trump’s defense secretary from July 2019 through November 2020, when he was fired by Trump by tweet following the 2020 election.